Six beautiful poems, one a Word & Image. All powerful and unique. Which is your Pick of the Month for June 2026?
- Khairina Anindya, ‘Khair’: a compelling re-entry into the vital theme of motherhood and what it is to have a child
- Dylan Foster, ‘Sabbatical’: a practical solution for a spiritual and mental resetting, whereby the planets the stars and the self regain their harmony
- Hannah Linden, ‘Humanoid’: out-of-kilter anthropomorphic imagery which questions what being human might be, especially in the present AI times
- Luke Moran, ‘Twitch’: the power in the diction towards the end is where this poem, sweetened by its brevity, makes its mark upon the reader
- Gabrielle Meadows, ‘On sunday morning you lay together laughing’: a timeless place where a mother and daughter(?) relationship is rekindled and rewilded
- Nina Nazir, ‘Forecast’: a beautiful blackout poem that is truly a masterclass in the form.
All six of the shortlist have been chosen by Helen, Kate and Sabine or received the most attention on social media. They can be found below. (Please scroll down.)
Please VOTE HERE. Voting will close at 6pm on Monday 13 July.
Our ‘prize’ is £25 towards the charity of their choice or an emailed National Book Token giftcard*.
*Book tokens can only be used within the UK. Sadly, we are unable to find suitable cost-effective alternatives outside the UK.
THE JUNE 2026 PICK OF THE MONTH SHORTLIST
Khair
At the feet
of al-Ka‘ba
you asked for a daughter.
You named me
Khair – Blessing.
I answered
inside you
forcing myself into your ribs
remaking you
in the emptiness of your lungs.
in the space he made—
his shoes
left in the doorway
your words—
not at the tip of your tongue
but caught at your teeth.
imprinting your face and his
I carry you
under my tongue.
Khairina Anindya is an engineer from Indonesia, currently based in the Netherlands. She writes poetry shaped by culture and memory. She enjoys reading across different literary traditions.
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Sabbatical
there’s not much you can do
when the planets
are telling you to stop
and gravity, who
only wants the best from us,
says
get down to the ground, that
you are
wanted, and so
you obey, become as
asphalt or fertiliser. you press yourself
into the earth suppress your
own need. your limbs turn to
branches then learning new
ways to grow and eventually
you’re there long enough that
everything you write and
do is mirrored
by the stars again.
Dylan Foster is a poet based in Surrey, U.K. When not writing he can be found hiking or playing the marimba. He has previously been published in Cordite Poetry Review.
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Humanoid
I was cutlery left out in the rain, rusty
by morning, a side-slipping fiddlestick
desperate for music, starved for company.
You were a knockoff BOGOF version
of a briny punk with a commitment phobia
permanently out of your habitat and time zone.
We were observable repairs, reorganised
schedules looking for a fix, butchered
invoices and recriminations.
They were observing aliens, measuring
intonation and feedback loops. And we
let them cut into us because we felt
we owed them for letting us play ‘being
human’. And we were wild and free
as they loaded us into the future machines.
Hannah Linden won Cafe Writers Poetry Competition 2021, Highly Commended Wales Poetry Award 2021 & 2nd prize Leeds Peace Poetry Prize 2024. Her debut pamphlet, The Beautiful Open Sky (V. Press), shortlisted for Saboteur Award 2023. BlueSky: @hannahl1n.bsky.social
*
On sunday morning you lay together laughing
She gets into your bed
like when she was little.
Flowers grow out of the wardrobe,
moss claims the windowsill
and a vine
snakes its way to the bed post,
climbing.
You are laughing.
Imagine she is bounding
from the garden,
skin laced with sweat.
Smells of pollen and soil.
Imagine you need to get up but don’t yet.
Five more minutes.
This is all there is
and all there ever is.
The moss claims the windowsill
and every inch of earth.
Gabrielle Meadows lives in Norfolk and works in arts education. She runs workshops in drama and improvisation. Previous publications in Ink Sweat & Tears, Atrium Poetry and The Lake. @gabrielle_meadows
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Twitch
There’s a
flash of colour
from the hedge.
His arm
shoots up and
hangs pointing –
at the empty space
where the movement
was. As
he names the bird he thinks he saw
Luke Moran is from Folkestone, he works there in the public sector and writes there when he can. He is a husband, step-father, grandfather and birdwatcher and plays various musical instruments at various levels of competence.
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Forecast
biro, gel pen & found text on paper, 2026
Nina Nazir is a British Pakistani poet, writer and fine artist based in Birmingham, UK. She has been published widely online and in print, most recently with Under the Radar and The Ekphrastic Review. She is a Room 204 writing cohort with Writing West Midlands. You can usually find her with her nose in a book, making hybrid poem art or putting one word in front of the other. You can also find her at https://ninasnazir.substack.com/
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